


On Errantry

by Mercutio



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies), Young Wizards - Diane Duane
Genre: Declarations Of Love, Gen, Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-30
Updated: 2016-07-30
Packaged: 2018-07-27 17:27:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7627372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mercutio/pseuds/Mercutio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darcy is a wizard.  At least in her own mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On Errantry

Darcy Lewis had a mission on this Earth.

It wasn't a mission that could be talked about. She'd learned that through painful experience. But it was one that gave her purpose, which was something she'd noticed most people missed out on. She longed sometimes to share her purpose with others, both to have other people working with her and as motivation for the hopeless. However, a year and a half of mandatory counseling in middle school after enthusiastically expressing her conviction that she was going to be a wizard to her classmates had taught her to keep her mouth shut.

It wasn't that she believed in magic. Well, she *did*. She just didn't believe that *she* had any of the sorcerer-y hocus pocus variety. Too many possibilities existed for there not to be magic somewhere. Real magic.

She believed in her own magic though: the power of a person to change the world through their own words and actions. On her own at the age of 12, she had read Diane Duane's Young Wizards' series and had found the Wizard's Oath there. She knew the books to be fiction. But the words of the Oath rang true and she took them for her own. "In Life's name and for Life's sake, I assert that I will employ the Art which is its gift in Life's service alone, rejecting all other usages. I will guard growth and ease pain. I will fight to preserve what grows and lives well in its own way; and I will change no object or creature unless its growth and life, or that of the system of which it is part, are threatened. To these ends, in the practice of my Art, I will put aside fear for courage, and death for life, when it is right to do so -- till Universe's end."

The Oath took her into studying political science -- how better to change the world and guide it away from entropy than politics? Darcy had plans on how to sneak into that world as first a volunteer, and eventually an aide, and somehow slowly grow her ideas into being. To make small changes that would have large effects down the line.

Then chance struck and right when she would have graduated, she was told that her university no longer supported the accreditation of the CLEP tests she'd taken to earn her science credits. She needed six science credits and fast or she'd have to somehow find a way to fund yet another semester at college -- and the internship she'd lined up with a senator in Pennsylvania would fall through.

So there she was, in the middle of Nowhere, New Mexico, caretaking an astrophysicist who didn't have enough sense to eat when she was hungry and sleep when she was tired, when definitive proof of magic landed right in front of her in the form of an interstellar alien bellowing in archaic English about mystical weaponry.

What was she supposed to do? She tased him.

\----

While Darcy had learned that Thor was (relatively) harmless, events with the Destroyer and the subsequent invasion of New York left her skeptical about his brother. Loki's subsequent self-sacrifice on Svartalfheim could have changed this, but then he'd apparently taken over the throne of Asgard.

Loki's sudden appearance in Jane's laboratory in full armor left Darcy with one response.

She narrowed her eyes and gave him her best, "I mean it" glare. "Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance."

He cocked his head, expression changing to one of delighted intrigue. "I could get used to being called 'fairest' and your politeness is appreciated. So many people today just starting screaming when they see me. May I know your name?"

"It's Darcy Lewis."

"Darcy!" Jane hissed. "Don't interact with him. This isn't the time to pretend to be a wizard."

Loki's smile widened. "You imagine yourself to be a wizard? It's obvious that you don't have any seidr. What power or powers do you have? Go ahead. Use your pretense on me. See how you fare."

Darcy took a deep breath and stiffened her spine. He'd dared her. And she had magic powers. They just weren't literally magic. "I love and I know the truth when I see it. Those are my powers. Are you sure that you want me to use those on you?"

"You hope to harm me with mere feelings?" He laughed. "That may be one of the most amusing things I've heard in the past century."

"Just remember. You asked for it." Darcy drew herself closer to him. "You're in pain. You hate yourself for something and you're taking it out on the world. Worlds." She drew in her breath sharply as a possibility occurred to her. "You're doing that because you can't take your anger out on the one who caused it. They're either too powerful or you like them too much to be angry with them. Oh. Of course. It's something your parents did. From what I hear, Odin's a bag of dicks, so it was probably his fault. And your mom, Frigga, is pretty cool, so if you're angry at her too, then you're in denial about that 'cause you don't want to be, because being angry at the best thing in your life makes you feel worse about yourself. Dude." She looked up at him, meeting his inscrutable gaze. "That's messed up. I'm sorry that they made you feel that way about yourself. Whatever it is that made you hate yourself so much. That makes you want to prove to everyone that you deserve to be hated, because of course you don't deserve to be hated. No one deserves to be hated. Not even you." She stepped forward cautiously and reached out. Loki didn't move. She reached around him and hugged him. Dude was tall and warm and thinner than he looked. "I care about you. I don't think you deserve to be hated. You deserve to be loved. I'll love you, if you want."

Loki stared at her, eyes transitioning through hopelessness, loss, wonder and back to hardness.

Darcy stumbled as Loki dissolved from her embrace, vanishing completely.

"Was it something I said?"


End file.
